Stop Information Overload: Why Silence Is Your Best Business Strategy
Show Notes
We live in a world that is terrified of silence. We treat it like a hole that needs to be filled. The second the elevator door closes, the phone comes out. The second we hit a red light, the podcast goes on. We are terrified of being bored.
But in this episode, celebrating my 50th birthday, I’m sharing why silence isn't "empty"—it’s a boardroom.
If you feel like you are working harder than ever but aren't moving forward, it isn't because you are lazy. It is because you are maxed out. We discuss the concept of being "Content Drunk"—where we confuse "Input" (taking courses, reading books) with "Output" (doing the work). I also break down the neuroscience behind the "Strategy Room" (your brain's Default Mode Network) and why you physically cannot generate big ideas while you are consuming content.
Plus, I’m officially launching Paced, a new tool designed to put a speed bump between you and the autopilot scroll.
In This Episode:
(00:00) – Why my family thinks I’ve lost my mind (The Silent Drive)
(01:26) – You aren't lazy, you are maxed out: Drowning out intuition with noise
(03:40) – The "Rattle": Why your brain feels like a marble in a spray paint can
(04:27) – Are you "Content Drunk"? The trap of confusing Input with Output
(06:40) – The Science: Task Positive Network vs. Default Mode Network
(09:06) – The Calgary Drive: How a 5-hour silent trip birthed a marketing strategy
(11:09) – Experiential Avoidance: Using noise as a drug to avoid the truth
(13:55) – Introducing Paced: How to create a "speed bump" for your phone
Resources Mentioned:
The Paced App: A tool designed to interrupt the autopilot and help you earn your time back.
The Concept: "Experiential Avoidance" – using distraction to avoid uncomfortable feelings.
This Week's Challenge:
Find Your "Calgary Drive" This week, I challenge you to go "digitally naked" (keep your clothes on, please). Pick one activity—your commute, the shower, or walking the dog—and do it with zero input. No headphones, no radio, no phone calls. Drive through the boredom until you get to the boardroom.
🔗 CONNECT WITH RHONDA
Website: rhondalavoie.com
Instagram: @rhonda.lavoie
Facebook: Rhonda Lavoie
TikTok:@ rhonda.lavoie
Follow the Paced App journey: getpaced.app
· Music for The Rhonda Lavoie Podcast written and recorded by Wade and Tan Fehr.
Transcript
[00:00:00] My family thinks I've lost my mind. Seriously, they get in the car with me, they reach for the dial. They want the radio, they want the playlist, they want the podcast. And I say, no. And we drive in silence and it drives them crazy. They sit there fidgeting, looking out the window twitching because it's too quiet.
[00:00:26] They think it's boring, but here's the truth. I'm not doing it to be mean, and I'm not doing it because I'm some zen monk who loves the sound of tires on pavement. I'm doing it because my brain is too loud. I can't hear myself think. We live in a world that is terrified of silence. We treat silence like it's a hole that needs to be filled.
[00:00:52] The second the elevator door closes, our phone comes out. The second we hit a red light, the podcast has to come on. We are terrified of being bored, but I realized something on a drive to Calgary recently. Silence isn't empty. Silence is a boardroom. Silence is the only place where the strategy happens. If you feel like you are working harder than ever, but you aren't moving forward, it's not because you're lazy.
[00:01:26] Because you're maxed out, you are drowning out your own intuition with other people's noise. Today we're turning the volume down.
[00:01:38] Welcome back to the podcast. I am your host, Rhonda Lavoie, and we are deep in season four. Here on the podcast, we have talked about your calendar. We've talked about your countertops, we've talked about the good girl syndrome that keeps you apologizing for taking up space. But today. Today is a little different because on Friday I turn 50.
[00:02:00] Yeah, five zero. And usually when you hit a milestone like that, people wait for the midlife crisis. They wait for you to buy the red convertible or book the Eat, pray, love trip to Bali because you feel empty. But I'm not buying the convertible because the truth is. I found the cure for the midlife crisis a few years ago.
[00:02:23] It wasn't a purchase, it was a practice. I realized about three years ago that the reason I felt like I was suffocating wasn't because I didn't have enough things. It was because I didn't have enough space. So I started doing something that drove my family crazy. I turned the volume off. Today we're talking about noise, not the construction outside the house.
[00:02:50] I'm talking about the rattle, the internal noise that keeps you up until 3:00 AM. If you are listening to this and you feel like your brain is a browser with 400 tabs open and you are waiting for a midlife crisis, just so that you have an excuse to scream, I want to show you a cheaper way to fix it. Let me ask you a question.
[00:03:16] When was the last time you had a thought that was a 100 % yours? A thought that wasn't a reaction to a text, that wasn't opinion. You heard on the podcast, that wasn't a to-do list item for your kids. We all have this list running in the background for me even now. The list is wild. Real estate deals falling apart.
[00:03:40] Parent council emails. The launch of this app, juggling financing, marketing strategy. What are we having for dinner? It's a rattle. It's like a marble in a spray can going clack, clack, clack. And look, I don't wanna sit here and pretend I'm some zen master living in a monastery. I'm not perfect at this.
[00:04:03] There are absolutely days where the overwhelm is too high and I just can't, I don't want to deal with the anxiety, I don't want to hear my own thoughts. So yeah, I'll turn on the music, or I'll binge watch a couple of episodes of a show just to shut my brain off. That is human. We all need to check out sometimes, but the problem is when we stay there.
[00:04:27] The problem is when we get content drunk, and I see this happening so much with ambitious women, maybe you aren't scrolling reels. Maybe you are learning. You know the type. Maybe you are the type, you sign up for the coaching program. You buy the masterclass, you read the latest business book.
[00:04:49] You listen to three podcasts before breakfast, and you feel busy. You feel like you are working on your business. But you aren't. We confused input with output. Taking a course is input. Hiring a coach is input. Reading a book is input. Strategy. Making the cold call, launching the product that is output. And here's the hard truth
[00:05:18] I had to learn. You cannot have output. While you're drowning in input. I see this in our industry all the time. I know agents who have taken every single course on the market. They have the buyer's agent designation, the seller's agent designation. They did the social media bootcamp. They read every book, but they haven't picked at the phone to call a client in two weeks.
[00:05:42] Why? Because they're using learning as a way to procrastinate on doing. It feels safer to be a student, than to be a leader, but you cannot steer the ship if you're constantly reading the manual. At some point, you have to put the book down, stop the podcast, look at the horizon, and grab the wheel. And you can't do that if you're terrified of silence.
[00:06:11] Now I know what you're thinking. Rhonda, I get it. I'm busy, but I can multitask. I can listen to a podcast and drive. I can answer emails and watch tv. No, you can't. I wanna get a little nerdy with you for a second because learning this changed how I view my car rides. Neuroscientists have found that the brain has two main modes and they cannot be on at the same time.
[00:06:40] Mode one is the task positive network. This is when you are doing stuff, answering an email, listening to this podcast, folding laundry. Your brain is focused on the, now. It is processing input, but there is a second mode, and it only turns on when you stop. And it's called the Default Mode network, or DMN.
[00:07:04] This is the network that lights up when you're daydreaming. When you are staring out the window, when you're driving on a long highway and you zone out. For a long time, scientists thought this was wasted time. They thought the brain was idle. But they were wrong. The default mode network is the strategy room.
[00:07:25] It is the only place in your brain that connects past memories with future plans. It is the only place where dot A connects to B to create a new idea. Think about it. Where do you get your best ideas? Is it while you're scrolling Instagram? No, it's in the shower. It's while you're walking the dog. It's when you're doing the dishes.
[00:07:48] Why? Because for those five minutes, you aren't on your phone, you aren't feeding the beast. You gave your brain a second to breathe, and it immediately went to work solving your biggest problems. So here's the scary truth. If you never allow yourself to be bored, if you never allow yourself to sit in silence, if you plug in a podcast every single time you get in the car, you are physically blocking your own genius.
[00:08:21] You are locking the door to the strategy room, you're keeping the open sign on the convenience store, but you never went to the back office to check the inventory. So I've been practicing this for a while now. I drive in silence. No radio, no podcast, just me and my thoughts. And I'll be honest, it drives my family nuts.
[00:08:44] They get in the car and they want the music, they want the noise, but I need the space. And a couple of months ago, I have a perfect example of why I do this. I had to drive to Calgary and it's a long haul, just open highway. . Now look at it through the lens of a busy woman. You look at a five hour drive and your brain instantly goes to productivity mode.
[00:09:06] You think, okay, I have five hours. I can finally finish that audiobook, or I can catch up on a month's worth of podcasts. I can listen to that masterclass on how to 10 x my business. We are conditioned to treat an empty car like a wasted asset.
[00:09:22] We feel guilty if we are filling every second with learning, but I fought that urge. I knew that if I filled that time with other people's voices, I wouldn't be out to hear my own. So I drove in silence and hear me out. It isn't always peaceful. Sometimes, especially at the start. It's uncomfortable. You are sitting there with nothing but your own anxiety.
[00:09:51] You are sitting there with the problems you've been avoiding because the noise isn't there to cover them up anymore. The silence forces you to look at the things you usually drowned out. But because I stayed in it, the magic happened. Somewhere on that highway, the rattle settled down and the ideas started to drop in.
[00:10:13] I actually worked out the entire marketing strategy for the Paced app on that drive. I didn't have a whiteboard. I didn't have a team. I just had a windshield and a quiet brain. I solved problems in that car that had been stuck in my head for weeks. Why? Because I gave my brain the space to do its job. I stopped being the student listening to someone else tell me how to run my business.
[00:10:43] And I became the CEO, who actually figured it out. I know that it sounds a little scary. You're probably thinking that sounds great for you, but if I sit in silence, I'm going to spiral. I'm going to think about how I hate my job, or how my marriage feels lonely, or how overwhelmed I am. I get it. We use the noise as a drug.
[00:11:09] We use it to avoid the truth. There's actually a fancy term for this called experiential avoidance. It basically means we distract ourselves so we don't have to feel uncomfortable feelings. But here's the thing about avoidance. It's a credit card. You can pay for it now or you can pay for it later with interest.
[00:11:34] By drowning out that anxiety with Netflix or music, you aren't fixing it. You're just delaying it, and it grows in the dark. The silence is the only place where you can actually look the monster in the face and realize it's not that big. So in that car ride to Calgary, I had to face some fears. I had to face the fear that maybe at 50 I was too old to launch a tech company.
[00:12:03] But because I faced it in the silence. I could answer it. I could say, no, I'm not too old. I'm experienced. If I had listened to a podcast, I never would have had that conversation with myself. I would've just kept the low level hum of anxiety running in the background. Silence is not passive. Silence is a strategy.
[00:12:29] We treat silence like it's lazy. We think if we aren't doing something or listening to something, we are wasting our time. But that is a lie. Imagine trying to navigate your life, raising the kids, building the business, keeping the marriage alive while standing in the middle of a rock concert. Now, I love myself a rock concert, but we just can't.
[00:12:54] You can't. You're just surviving in the noise. We're burning ourselves out, trying to process a million inputs a day. We don't need more voices in our head. We need to hear our own. So how do we do this? I can't drive to Calgary every day, neither can you. And let's be real. I'm not perfect at this.
[00:13:19] I pull into my driveway after a silent drive and I feel great. But then I walk into the house and the noise starts, the dogs, the kids, the questions, and I feel the pull. Do you know the one, the pull to pick up the phone?
[00:13:35] Just to check out for a second, to numb myself , before I deal with the chaos, I realized I couldn't just use willpower because willpower is a battery and by 5:00 PM mine is dead. I can't just decide not to scroll when I'm exhausted. The device is smarter than me. It is designed to hook me.
[00:13:55] I needed a tool that wasn't a punishment. I didn't need a jail for my phone. I needed a speed bump. This is why I built Paced. We launch on Friday, my 50th birthday, but I wanna tell you how it works. Paced is designed to interrupt the autopilot. You choose the apps that usually suck you in Instagram, Facebook, the news, the stuff you open without even thinking.
[00:14:20] Then you set a timer when that timer goes off. Paced steps in, puts up a gentle wall. It pauses the app. Now you have a choice. You can wait. You can let the timer cool down on its own. Or if you really wanna get back in and speed it up, you can move your body to earn the time back faster.
[00:14:41] It's not about restricting you, it's about waking you up. That little bit of friction, that choice. That is your silent car moment. It gives you just enough space to ask yourself, do I actually wanna be doing this or am I just bored? And 9 times outta 10, when that screen pauses, I realize I don't wanna go back in.
[00:15:04] I realize I was just looking for a dopamine hit. And in that little moment of pause, that tiny slice of silence, I make a better choice. I put the phone down, I take a breath. And I get my brain back. So here is my challenge to you this week. Find your Calgary Drive. Maybe it's your commute, maybe it's the shower, maybe it's walking the dog.
[00:15:29] Do it naked, digitally naked. Please keep your clothes on. No headphones, no radio, no phone call, just you and your brain. It's going to feel weird. It's going to feel boring. You are going to itch. Let it itch. Drive through the boredom until you get to the boardroom.
[00:15:51] Listen to what your brain is trying to tell you when it's not competing with a reel. You might just hear a million dollar idea, or at least you might figure out what's for dinner. Now, before I let you go, I have one massive announcement this Friday, February 13th. Is the big day. It's my 50th birthday, and we are officially launching Paced To The World.
[00:16:13] If you're done fighting a losing battle with your phone, come join us. You can find the app right now at getpaced.app And hey, if this episode hit a nerve, if you felt seen today, do me a huge favor. Leave a 5 star review for the show. It takes two seconds.
[00:16:32] But it helps other women like us find this conversation. For the show notes, links to the apps and everything else we talked about today, head over to rhondalavoie.com. I'll see you next week. As always, keep it real and get it done.
